joedad

thenthenandDefinitely parallels here, and via Layman's primary evidence criteria.

GakuseiDon

Yes, there are similarities. There were similarities between Kennedy's death and Lincoln's death.

The next step, then, is: what do these similarities mean?

joedad

Precisely. So play your best trump card. I know it's certainly not the Lincoln/Kennedy metaphor.

GakuseiDon

Most of the Mithra similarities are rubbish: Virgin birth (he was born from a rock), twelve followers (he was a sun god and was associated with the 12 signs of the zodiac who weren't "followers" in a personal sense), Killing (he is never killed) and resurrection (he never resurrects as he never dies).

Justin Martyr was a product of the times, so attributed the similarities to influence by demons. There is nothing unusual about having a special meal of bread and wine. For Christianity, you need look no further than Judaism and the Passover. Tertullian doesn't give examples, so it is hard to tell.

Tertullian wrote about 200 CE. There is no doubt that in the centuries after Christianity was established, Christianity was influenced by pagan religions and Greek philosophy. But there is no evidence for the things claimed of Horus and Mithra as I've mentioned.

Attonitus

When Mithra born (1400 BCE) Jesus still didn't have diapers. The influence of the Mithraic supper in the Christian supper is outside of all doubt. Justin was impressed by the likeness, and Tertullian, son of a follower's Mithraist, it is truly annoying. Mithra it is a solar deity that dies and raised annually. As for the rest I agree with you.

joedad

Agreed

Pretty much agreed, all except for your dismissing JM's testimony re Mithraism. If you're willing to state that there's nothing special about a meal of bread and wine, you must also be willing to state that there is nothing special about death by crucifixion, or about resurrection, or about virgin births, or demigods, because in point of fact you know there is not.

Our perspectives differ I guess. To me, christianity is a few wavelengths in the religious spectrum. Indeed, with so many influences and similarities, it is well nigh impossible to say with any certainty exactly where and when on that spectrum christianity is established. To focus so intently on believed christian wavelengths is to dismiss and miss the influence and existence of all the rest.

But that is why I asked what's unique about christianity. How does someone like me identify a christian fingerprint in those early centuries? How do you? Do you have a personal methodology? As best I can tell it is whenever we have use of the word "Christ," and not much if anything else. But even at that, and as you agree, "Christ" assumes and accepts a large degree of pagan and other influence. Maybe christianity should even be separated into christianity and proto-christianity. But "Christ" does seem to be the best marker. All else is far less certain.

GakuseiDon

You are confusing Roman Mithraism (started around 70 BCE) with Persian Mithraism. Beyond the name of the god, they were two completely different religions.

Please show me the evidence that the Mithraic supper influenced the Christian supper. Justin doesn't give any details beyond the use of bread and wine, which, as I've said, it is more logical to assume was influenced from Judaism.

How does Mithra die?

GakuseiDon

I pretty much agree with you. My personal methodology is simple: an evaluation of the evidence at hand.

spin

Just a parenthesis, Gak. Calling "Roman Mithraism" is a slight misnomer (though I guess you could call it a shorthand and get away with it). The religion got to Rome basically as the Romans received it, brought back to Rome by soldiers involved in ridding Cilicia (the area around Tarsus) of pirates who had been a bane in everybody's side for a while. Soldiers were not known as great innovators and the basic Mithraic iconography seems to be described by a writer of the late 1st c. CE (Statius).

Mithra was of course a god for both the Indians and the Iranians, being a sun god, which explains why he so easily coalesced with the religion of Constantine, that of Sol Invictus, and his coins featured the inscription "Sol Mithras Deus Invictus" for many years after the battle of the Milvian Bridge (another misnomer, for it was fought a few miles upstream).

There is nothing I can see in the early literature that connects Mithras with the slaying of the bull, yet the slaying of the bull is an act of creation. Hmmm. At the same time this slaying of the bull provided the blood for the Mithraic baptism, but such baptism seems to have been practised in other mystery religions from the near east.

At the same time e need to explain why the religion practised by the Roman soldiery featured the god with a Phrygian cap, an element that certainly wasn't the product of any Roman activity. I think we have to face the fact that the Mithraic cult had developed before the Romans got hold of it and was in that state already in Cilicia and thus available to Paul, if he paid attention to it, though such things would be hard not to have any knowledge of.

Why is it more logical? There's nothing strange about initiates sharing meals throughout the Greek world.

This is a good question, for I personally am not sure he does die. One version I've come across has him returning to heaven from whence he is to come again.

(This post should not be read as an acceptance of any conclusions about a possible relationship between xianity and mithraism.)


spin

Attonitus

No. The statement it is true. The reference is to the Mithra's origins, not to the Roman Mithraism ???. Mithra it is a deity oldest that Jesus. The Mithraism expands for the Empire circa 120 BCE (no around 70 BCE). In 67 BCE the first congregation of Mithras soldiers existed in Rome under Pompey, later the Mithraism will be authorized by the Flavian dynasty.

Wrong again. According Tertullian "Mithra there...celebrates also the oblation of bread", and according Justin, "Which the wicked devils have imitated in the mysteries of Mithras, commanding the same thing to be done"

You can explain this Tertullian quote? "Mithra there...introduces an image of resurrection"